Colgate-Palmolive, for example, is one of TerraCycle’s largest key partners with a multi-fold commitment to sustainability. Regardless of brand, Colgate allows all oral care products and packaging to be recycled through their sponsorship of the Colgate Oral Care Recycling Program, empowering their consumers to collect these plastics on a national scale.

The teacher received a $25 gift certificate to the store of her choice, a cork board made out of wine corks from TerraCycle, reams of recycled paper and a membership to Resource Depot.

They collect cigarette butts separately because they can be recycled. Trash Tramps organizer Nancy Schulz says they bring the butts to the Central Vermont Solid Waste Management District office, and they eventually make their way to a New Jersey recycling company called Terracycle.

DePaolo Middle School is competing to win a playground made from recycled oral care waste through the second annual Recycled Playground Challenge, courtesy of Colgate-Palmolive ("Colgate"), the global oral care leader; ShopRite, which has more than 250 stores in the Northeast; and recycling pioneer TerraCycle.

One of TerraCycle’s longtime partners, MOM Brands (Malt-O-Meal Company), rejects the common cereal packaging setup, instead packaging its cereal brands in a re-sealable plastic bag that creates 75 percent less packaging waste than comparably sized cereal boxes. What’s more, MOM Brands’ cereal bags can be recycled through TerraCyclethrough its sponsored program, which also accepts plastic cereal box liners from conventional cereal packaging.

But for the substitute teacher behind Zion-Concord Lutheran School's entry in the TerraCycle Recycled Playground Challenge, it's not so much about a new outdoor play space -- although the school's swings were knocked out in a maintenance accident and some of the playground equipment is roughly 25 years old.

Terracycle, a New Jersey company, partners with many manufacturers to recycle packaging. Collect participating products and ship them off. Groups like Colgate, Capri Sun, Clif Bar, Entenmann’s, Brita and Glad, to name a few are involved in this program.

DePaolo Middle School is competing to win a playground made from recycled oral care waste through the second annual Recycled Playground Challenge, courtesy of Colgate-Palmolive (“Colgate”), the global oral care leader; ShopRite, which has more than 250 stores in the Northeast; and recycling pioneer TerraCycle.

Though the thin plastic roll bags can't be recycled in city-collected recycling bins, they can be recycled at the Co-op starting June 8. The grocery will collect the bags under a partnership with the recycling company Terra Cycle, which specializes in "hard-to-recycle waste" including toothpaste tubes, baby food pouches and energy bar wrappers.

All the butts collected will be sent into TerraCycle to be recycled into a variety of industrial products, such as plastic pallets. Please join us next year we need all the help we can get to clean up our city, country and planet. Visit www.agreenerfuture.ca to find out what you can do to help!